The effect of children’s sleeping patterns during admission to a paediatric intensive care unit on the subsequent development of acute PTSD

Clark, Frances (2015). The effect of children’s sleeping patterns during admission to a paediatric intensive care unit on the subsequent development of acute PTSDHonours Thesis, School of Psychology, The University of Queensland.

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The prevalence of Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) in Paediatric Intensive Care Units (PICUs) have become a common source of concern for nurse practitioners. Despite the profound risk of long term psychological distress resulting from stays in PICU, limited evidence has explored factors which increase children’s risk of developing PTSD. Currently, inconsistent evidence suggests that perhaps intubation, sedation and delirious or poor memories play a significant role in the development of PTSD. The gap in this literature is the lack of exploration of the effects of poor sleep on PTSD. Sedation and increased time spent intubated decrease the quality of patient sleep which in turn has been found to increase delirium and poor memory of the PICU experience. As poor sleep has been found to strongly correlate with later PTSD and child psychiatry, it is suggested that poor sleep in PICU may be the underlying factor which increases children’s risk of PTSD development. The current study subsequently hypothesised that the unique relationship between sleep time and negative sleeping patterns when controlling for sedation and intubation would be significant predictors of acute PTSD. Results of a 3 block logistic regression supported these predictions. Sedation and increased time spent intubated were significantly associated with poor sleep and acute PTSD. When examining the unique role of each factor, only the presence of negative sleeping patterns were marginally predictive of acute PTSD diagnosis. Suggestions for further research in order to consolidation the role of PICU sleep on PTSD and develop interventions for PTSD are discussed.